Apple adds Universal as iCloud licensing partner

Apple has signed a licensing deal with Universal Music Group, incorporating all four of the major record companies into its iTunes iCloud music plans.

Citing "sources with knowledge of the talks," CNET reported today that, in addition to Universal, Apple has also reached agreements with "some of the large music publishers."

Apple announced earlier this week that it would feature iCloud at its Worldwide Developers Conference next week, detailing its plans for the new web service.

It is believed that Apple's iCloud will deliver a streaming media repository for users' commercial digital content. iOS 5 is also expected to add new features that make it easy for users to automatically upload and publish their photos, movies, and other content directly from iOS mobile devices.

Apple already offers some basic streaming music and content sharing via MobileMe, but the new iCloud is understood to dramatically expand upon these features and add new ones.

Apple has signed a licensing deal with Universal Music Group, incorporating all four of the major record companies into its iTunes iCloud music plans.

Citing "sources with knowledge of the talks," CNET reported today that, in addition to Universal, Apple has also reached agreements with "some of the large music publishers."

Apple announced earlier this week that it would feature iCloud at its Worldwide Developers Conference next week, detailing its plans for the new web service.

It is believed that Apple's iCloud will deliver a streaming media repository for users' commercial digital content. iOS 5 is also expected to add new features that make it easy for users to automatically upload and publish their photos, movies, and other content directly from iOS mobile devices.

Apple already offers some basic streaming music and content sharing via MobileMe, but the new iCloud is understood to dramatically expand upon these features and add new ones.

While it is very nice that Apple is unveiling with all their ducks in order (ibooks, ATV2 with tv renting) I am much more interested in the film studios being on board.

My reasoning is with my ATV2 I want access to all my purchased movies all the time ( I like to own movies). The problem is i only have a laptop, and having it open/on all the time is less than ideal. Having access to all my movies to stream while at home or over any wifi would be fantastic.

I wonder in all these changes going on any day now if Apple is going to tackle the thorny issue of current TV content. What is sorely needed IMHO is a subscription model rather than only for rent? That is surely the future of TV, streamed to any device on demand the same day as the show comes out for a reasonable monthly fee. Perhaps with or without ads at two prices.

From Apple ][ - to new Mac Pro I've owned them all.Long on AAPL so biased"Google doesn't sell you anything, Google just sells you!"

I wonder in all these changes going on any day now if Apple is going to tackle the thorny issue of current TV content. What is sorely needed IMHO is a subscription model rather than only for rent? That is surely the future of TV, streamed to any device on demand the same day as the show comes out for a reasonable monthly fee. Perhaps with or without ads at two prices.

Can't you use Hulu for that?
The incessant commercials in it have stopped me using it, however. They really pile the ads on to the point the show is basically unwatchable.

Any computer, being not absolutely infallible, it behoves each of us to backup, duplicate and sometimes even backup our backups. Now we are acquiring a wider variety of devices. With SSD high speed storage become more and more prevalent, capacities are quite a bit less than with rotating disk storage, something dramatic is wanted and needed for mass storage, convenient storage, fast data transfer and easy syncing.

Also with the advent of Thunderbolt, especially in Apples' powerful note books MBP, and desktop, iMac. Yes there is the Mac tower. Coming is Macbook AIR with thunderbolt. Perhaps even iPad2 or the next generation model, don't know when ... but I think it is fair to assume reasonably soon.

Apple has been preparing for the eventuality of cloud storage, distribution, syncing libraries, etc.
This means wireless, but most wireless is slow and expensive when dealing with large backups. The huge facility in North Carolina ... more being developed on the West Coast and perhaps other countries as well (don't know much about the latter, but it would be fair to assume Apple has a long term plan).

So by investing in the domain name iCloud, and all that will come to mean ... by working with content providers for Music, Movies, TV, Radio, etc. ... it will be exciting to having a technically advanced infrastructure, that is EZ to work with and use, and hopefully economically reasonable. Free is not thinkable, since we live in a capitalistic society. Major software developers are on board and are coming up with wonderful apps.

Just my overview and observation of new and exceptional performing mobile and desktop computing devices. FWIW ... looking forward to June 6 announcements

If what has been said is true. (That Apple will scan our iTunes libraries and have it available for us in the Clouds).
This also means that Apple will have ways to scan our entire stuff. (Videos, Pictures, Files, Music, & Movies). But only if we give them permission to do so.
It will take a lot of Trust. (I am trusting of them) But mainly because this would be Hugh. No more worries about where I have them stored. No more worries about not having enough capacity.
It will be a little scary about some stuff. But without that trust, we would not progress to the Clouds full potential.

While it is very nice that Apple is unveiling with all their ducks in order (ibooks, ATV2 with tv renting) I am much more interested in the film studios being on board.

My reasoning is with my ATV2 I want access to all my purchased movies all the time ( I like to own movies). The problem is i only have a laptop, and having it open/on all the time is less than ideal. Having access to all my movies to stream while at home or over any wifi would be fantastic.

Agreed! When reading the article, my first thought was, I hope the Movie industry is taking note! As with music, Jobs has proven "easy" trumps "free!" (To some degree, anyway!)

If what has been said is true. (That Apple will scan our iTunes libraries and have it available for us in the Clouds).
This also means that Apple will have ways to scan our entire stuff. (Videos, Pictures, Files, Music, & Movies). But only if we give them permission to do so.
It will take a lot of Trust. (I am trusting of them) But mainly because this would be Hugh. No more worries about where I have them stored. No more worries about not having enough capacity.
It will be a little scary about some stuff. But without that trust, we would not progress to the Clouds full potential.

Apple has been scanning our/your library for a couple years now with Genius. Apple is using this information to deliver a better experience for their customer's, not to sell you ads.

Can't you use Hulu for that?
The incessant commercials in it have stopped me using it, however. They really pile the ads on to the point the show is basically unwatchable.

Even without commercials Hulu is more limited than iTunes Store TV show rentals. For instance, TV shows can can copied to a device to viewed offline with iTS and are better quality than Hulu's 480p bit rate. The latter isn't' a deal breaker but the former is if you want to watch TV shows on a flight that doesn't have WiFi. Even if you do have WiFi will it be fast enough to make it use of Hulu's streaming?

Dick Applebaum on whether the iPad is a personal computer: "BTW, I am posting this from my iPad pc while sitting on the throne... personal enough for you?"